The Poverty in Q and A by Vikas Swarup: The Portrait of Exploitation of Indian underclass

ABSTRACT

Poverty is the one of the most crucial problems in the world history till today; it reveals in any forms of human’s deprivation suck lack of food, house, dress etc. It has made poor people in the suffered condition. Furthermore, the poor people in India live in the structural poverty that they will never change the better life because any community that can determine someone can be rich or poor. Thus phenomenon is reflected in the novel Q and A by Vikas Swarup as Indian. It tells the worst condition happened the poor condition in India where the poor get poorer and poorer on the contrary the rich is richer and richer

Thus, this study is aimed to know how the structural poverty that is described in the novel, what the causes and effects of it and the last is how the Q and A reflect the real condition in India. Then, to achieve the problem of the study, the researcher uses sociological literary criticism as one method of this research. Moreover, the data of this research are collected from Q and A by Vikas Swarup. The researcher herself becomes the research instrument in the process of data collection and data analysis.

Based on the problem of the study, the result finding and analysis of this research is divided into three main parts generally. The first is describing structural poverty which appeared as social problem in India. Then, then second is the causes and effects of structural poverty, the researcher found that most of the reasons of appearance of the poverty. The data tells that the reasons of the structural poverty is caused by the passiveness of the government in seeing the poor and the unfair market that is always dominated by the rich because they have much capital. Here, many portraits of unfair treatments in the real condition of the poor in India appears in the novel; the poor in India go to worst which it can be seen that many slums house in middle of the city with no facilities to support their life. The trafficking does not only happen to the poor children but also the poor girl in India. The unfair treatment of the rich is they are ordered to work but the money must be paid to the employer, the rich only use the poor as money engine that only give profit to the rich. Many poor children can not get school because of poverty.

Finally, The story of the structural poverty in India is portrait from independent of India until now, the rich dominate in many sectors and the government does not pay attention to the poor. That phenomenon was percieved by the author. It indicates how the background of the author affects the work itself. It means that the story of structural poverty in India was told based on the real social condition.